234 ^^^ POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



to be distinct. The fact that these remains belong to extinct species 

 was of great importance. In the case of fossil shells, it was difficult 

 to say that any particular form was not living in a distant ocean ; but 

 the two species of existing elephants, the Indian and the African, were 

 well known, and there was hardly a possibility that another living one 

 would be found. 



It is important to bear in mind, too, that Cuviei-'s preparation for 

 the study of the remains of animals was far in advance of any of his 

 predecessors. He had devoted himself for years to careful dissections 

 in the various classes of the animal kingdom, and was really the 

 founder of comparative anatomy, as we now understand it. Cuvier 

 investigated the different groups of the whole kingdom with care, and 

 proposed a new classification, founded on the plan of structure, which 

 in its main features is the one in use to-day. The first volume of his 

 "Comparative Anatomy" appeared in 1800, and the work was com- 

 pleted in five volumes in 1805. 



Previous to Cuvier, the only general catalogue of animals was con- 

 tained in Linnaeus's " Systema Nature," In this work, as we have 

 seen, fossil remains were placed with the minerals, not in their appro- 

 priate places among the animals and plants. Cuvier enriched the ani- 

 mal kingdom by the introduction of fossil forms among the living, 

 bringing all together into one comprehensive system. His great work, 

 " Le Regne Animal," appeared in four volumes in 1817, and with its 

 two subsequent editions remains the foundation of modern zoology, 

 Cuvier's classic work on vertebrate fossils — " Recherches sur les Osse- 

 mens Fossiles," in four volumes, appeared in 1812-'13. Of this work 

 it is but just to say that it could only have been written by a man of 

 genius, profound knowledge, the greatest industry, and with the most 

 favorable opportunities. 



The introduction to this work was the famous " Discourse on the 

 Revolutions of the Surface of the Globe," which has perhaps been as 

 widely read as any other scientific essay. The discovery of fossil 

 bones in the gypsum-quarries of Paris by the workmen, who consid- 

 ered them human remains ; the careful study of these relics by Cuvier, 

 and his restorations from them of strange beasts that had lived long 

 before, is a story with which you are all familiar. Cuvier was the 

 first to prove that the earth had been inhabited by a succession of dif- 

 ferent series of animals, and he believed that those of each period 

 were peculiar to the age in which they lived. 



In looking over his work after a lapse of three quarters of a cen- 

 tury, we can now see that Cuvier was wrong on some important points, 

 and failed to realize the direction in which science was rapidly tend- 

 ing. "With all his knowledge of the earth, he could not free himself 

 from tradition, and believed in the universality and power of the 

 Mosaic deluge. Again, he refused to admit the evidence brought for- 

 ward by his distinguished colleagues against the permanence of spe- 



